Court hears claims that UAlbany student’s death not intended

The lawyer for Devon Callicut, the Albany man convicted of killing 22-year-old SUNY Albany student Richard Bailey in 2008, argued before an appellate court Tuesday that jurors at his client’s trial should have been able to consider manslaughter because Callicutt did may have not intended to kill Bailey when he shot him in the head.

The judges seemed to disagree.

My colleague Robert Gavin reports:

On Tuesday, Callicutt’s lawyer, Paul Connelly, argued that the jury which convicted Callicutt of first-degree murder in December 2010 should have been allowed to consider first-degree manslaughter as a lesser-included option. Connelly’s reasoning was that Callicutt may have intended to cause serious physical injury — not death — when he shot the college student.

The argument drew immediate skepticism from the five-judge panel of the Appellate Division of state Supreme Court. It heard the arguments as Jim and Lisa Bailey of Nassau County, the parents of the slain student, watched from the gallery joined by Albany County prosecutors and police.

“Where is the evidence to support it?” Presiding Appellate Justice Karen Peters quickly asked Connelly right after he began his argument. Peters noted Callicutt confessed to the murder in letters he tried to send to female friends while in prison for an unrelated crime in September 2009.

“Who was it that said, ‘I put the gun to his neck and it went off by accident?'” Peters asked Connelly.

“My client,” Connelly conceded quietly, noting Callicutt had uttered the statement to one of his former co-defendants.